


O is for Open

by MariaPriest



Series: Stargate Drabbles' Alphabet Challenge [16]
Category: Stargate SG-1
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-05
Updated: 2018-06-05
Packaged: 2019-05-18 17:53:30
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,251
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14857428
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MariaPriest/pseuds/MariaPriest
Summary: What happened when Jack woke up on and went back to P3X-562?





	O is for Open

**Author's Note:**

> Missing scene and tag for "Cold Lazarus"

The crystal object seems to seduce Jack, like a kind of benign, not-quite-inanimate Svengali that draws him closer to its stargate-like pool of ripples.

Suddenly, the ripples stop and he sees himself - wait ... not exactly. It _is_ his image, but it's within the crystal. He realizes the Jack in the crystal is looking out at him with guarded curiosity.

_Curious_ , he thinks to himself. _How can a rock be curious?_ It doesn't occur to him to ask how a rock could take on an independent image of him.

Jack removes his sunglasses without conscious intention. The image - he no longer thinks of it as _his_ image - blinks slowly, as if nodding with its eyelids, the only change since it first appeared. At the same time, he feels, rather than hears, a voice imbued with a kind of musical, magnetic force deep in his brain, saying something he doesn't understand. In _his_ voice. Saying something ... alien. At least that's what it seems like.

And then the voice is gone so quickly that he immediately begins to doubt it was ever there. Yet even in his doubt, he misses it. He reaches for the object, not entirely voluntarily though he is not aware of that, hoping to feel the voice again, to rid himself of the vague longing for it.

His fingers touch the crystal and time slows to a crawl in his brain. Instead of the voice's vibration, he feels electric agony coursing through his body. Grunting in surprise and pain, his body flies backwards, only to be stopped abruptly by a hillock of yellow sand.

He tries to expand his leaden lungs but can't, tries to slow his erratically beating heart but can't, tries to move but can't. The billion-watt power grid within tortures his organs, blood vessels, muscles, bones, even hair. Consciousness is fading but this is different from all the other times he has been knocked out. This time, he knows he is dying.

Then the voice is back, but it's not saying words; it's humming a soothing, lush, melodic tune. The hum swiftly spreads out across his body and completely suppresses the current, as if its additional power was enough to trip the circuit breaker. He wonders why the rock that almost killed him is now healing him. The agony weakens into generic, familiar pain, something a few handfuls of aspirin or a six-pack of Harp could handle.

As the pain decreases, Jack becomes aware of something unidentifiable probing his memories, his mind. He is naked, open, maddeningly vulnerable. He knows he should feel violated and enraged, but there is no malice in the probing, only a genuine desire to help, to understand. He thinks he is dying again, because his life is passing before his third eye.

When the probe finds the aching, torment-filled hole in his heart, Jack shuts down, now wanting to die. The deeply personal nature, coupled with the tremendous guilt, are too much to share with anyone. This is his alone.

OOOO

It is the sand blowing across his face that scratches Jack awake. He splays a hand over the top half of his face and groans. "Aw, crap," he mutters as he acknowledges the monumental stiffness of his muscles and joints and the near-crippling headache and his smoldering viscera. "Getting old should just be for the young," he says a little louder.

He blinks a few times beneath his hand before slowly removing it to find the sun has passed its peak. It's still fairly warm, so he figures he's safe for a time before the desert turns cold, assuming it does here. Enough time to work life back into a body that feels as if it's in full rigor. Slowly he works his fingers, then his wrists, elbows and so on until after an unexpectedly long time he believes he can actually stand up without falling back down. He chances it.

"Oh, God," Jack wheezes through a heavy grimace. On the bright side, he notices the headache is reaching tolerable levels. He staggers and stumbles in small, non-concentric circles but stays upright out of pure stubbornness. He thinks of Foster Brooks' drunk act and laughs, knowing he could give old Foster some competition right now.

Finally reaching a reasonably steady state, he calls out, "T!" - though he means to say "Teal'c." He rolls his eyes and reaches for a packet of water in his tac vest. After gratefully swallowing every drop, he clears his throat and tries again.

"Teal'c!"

No answer.

"Daniel!"

No answer.

"Carter!"

First thing that comes to mind is that his team, the people, the friends he is responsible for, got zapped as well - and he wasn't there to stop it because he went gallivanting off on what he mistakenly believed to be a low-to-no-risk planet.

What if they weren't as lucky as he was?

Fear ignites his adrenal glands. His senses sharpen, fatigue and the residual achiness vanish, his body tenses and becomes fully stable. He runs up the hill, down another one, at top speed, breathless only because of what he might find.

Jack finds no one after a long search. Just bunches of mostly broken blue rocks. No bodies buried under sand. Again he calls out for Teal'c, Daniel, and Carter - this time using "Samantha" because he knows she hates that and will respond just to nag him about it - but the only sound is the sand brushing past his ears and the crystals near his feet.

The realization of what has happened hits him harder than he thought it would. "Goddammit!"

The team - _his_ team - has left him behind.

Anger, fear, disappointment, and anxiety rise to new heights. He forces himself to remember this isn't Iraq. He will be home in minutes, not months.

Jack stays on the planet long enough to settle down a bit, so he isn't tempted to rip SG-1 a new one in public.

OOOO

They stand near the DHD. Jack doesn't want to go farther, the memory of the agonizing shock still too fresh.

Unity Charlie places his hand over Jack's heart one last time and looks deeply into the human's eyes. "Charlie."

Jack's eyes glisten with unshed tears once more. How can the "being" before him be both Charlie and not-Charlie? How did this Unity rock capture a piece of his son's essence - loving, wise beyond his years - in this bizarre manifestation?

"Uh, thanks," he says almost shyly. "Well, gotta get back. Stay in touch, okay? Pick up the phone, give us a call sometime. Somebody's always home."

Unity Charlie smiles, removes his hand, and languidly turns into several soft vertical rays of energy, the same color as the crystals. It forms a gentle fist with the index finger pointing to Jack then tapping the top of the rays. The rays become one, the shape reminding Jack of the Washington Monument, and heads for its few surviving family members.

Jack swears he feels a hum, deep in his brain, but shrugs it off when his searching for it yields nothing. He dials up the 'gate, enters his iris code after the event horizon settles into place, and slogs his way through the sand to go home.

The hum in his brain is still there, a gift, an open connection, beneath awareness, undetectable by anyone and anything except for him in the briefest of moments in those rarest of times when he lets his guard down and listens to the quantum spark that now resides there.

the end  
© 2014

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to CoriKay for the beta.


End file.
